Snowstorms putting strain on Brockton schools, coffers

Brockton city officials are requesting an extra $300,000 for snow removal while school leaders are considering bringing students to class on vacation days to make up for missed days.

By Alex Bloom

The Patriot Ledger, Quincy, MA

By Alex Bloom

Posted Mar. 9, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated Mar 9, 2013 at 9:11 AM

By Alex Bloom

Posted Mar. 9, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated Mar 9, 2013 at 9:11 AM

BROCKTON

» Social News

The forecast-defying March snowstorm is causing more confusion beyond the roughly 2 feet of snow it dropped on the city.

Brockton city officials are requesting an extra $300,000 for snow removal while school leaders are considering bringing students to class on vacation days to make up for missed days.

“We’ve maxed out the days,” said interim Brockton School Superintendent John Jerome.

Brockton school officials made the decision to cancel school for all students about 5 a.m. Friday. Jerome said he consulted with Operations Director Michael Thomas early Friday morning after forecasts underplayed the strength of the storm.

“It wasn’t, I don’t think, a smart thing to be calling school before there was an appreciable amount of snow on the ground,” Jerome said.

Before this week’s storm, Brockton students were scheduled to be in school until Friday, June 28. Based on contractual agreements with teachers, the school district cannot add any school days in July.

With Friday’s cancellation, Brockton will have to bring students to school on Good Friday, a Saturday session, or on one of the district’s scheduled April vacation days in order to meet the state’s requirement of 180 days of school, Jerome said.

Jerome said it has been more than 10 years since the district had to take similar measures.

Snowstorms are also causing a drain on Brockton’s city budget. Through Feb. 20, the city’s Department of Public Works had spent $1,784,355 in total snow removal costs of the city’s budgeted snow removal total $2,337,780.

DPW Commissioner Michael Thoreson asked Mayor Linda Balzotti and the City Council for the authority to spend an extra $500,000 on top of the $2.3 million, which Chief Financial Officer John Condon marked down to $300,000 in a request to the City Council.

Condon said in an email on Friday that he hoped the extra $300,000 would be sufficient – giving the city about $850,000 left for snow spending, if approved.

“It has been much worse than predicted and it is still snowing (as of Friday afternoon), so maybe we’ll need to go back again to council,” Condon said.

However, Condon said that the February blizzard’s costs were $782,880, meaning Friday’s snowstorm should cost less.

Thoreson said Friday afternoon that the city had about 20 trucks and 90 contracted plows out on the city streets trying to keep them clear.

“It’s a lot of snow so we’re moving it as best we can as fast we can,” Thoreson said. “But it’s going to take some time.”

Thoreson said the city targets main roads and secondary streets first, meaning that many residential streets and dead-end streets do not see a plow very often. He said that each street is plowed at least once during the storm in case of emergency.

Page 2 of 2 - “We try to make a swing through every street so emergency vehicles can up them as necessary,” Thoreson said.